Want to see bipartisan cooperation and political elites in all corners of the United States getting things done? Look no further than the continuing boom in sports facility construction.

Impoverished Washington DC may have the nation's highest rate of HIV/AIDS in the country,  the nation's highest child poverty level and a transportation infrastructure so pitiful that it regularly puts the city in the top three for worst city to commute in but this doesn't stop the wise leaders of the nation's capital to ante up 140 million to pay for a new ballpark for the Washington Nationals despite a majority of residents being understandably opposed.

Florida's investment pool, at risk of needing a taxpayer bailout, may be limiting municipal withdrawals to pay for teacher, firefighter and police salaries, but a new Baseball stadium for the Florida Marlins looks like it's got more of a chance of getting attention in Tallahassee than the state investment pool's liquidity crisis. And they're not the only team looking for a state handout - if they get what they're looking for, look for the Tampa Bay baseball team to look for an identical tax kick-back deal.

California may be facing a USD 14 billion budget deficit, but the owners of the baseball team in Oakland are still liking their chances to get state money to build a new stadium, which unlike ongoing state operating expenses like teacher's salaries, can be paid for by issuing bonds, the interest payments on which will simply create even bigger budget deficit issues for CA state and local government hamstrung by, among other less important factors, Proposition 13.

Mayor Bloomberg of New York, reported pondering a billion-dollar self-financed Presidential Bid under the "Unity `08" ticket New York Yankees deal, can claim to have accomplished not one, but two ballpark construction projects. That's some real political movement, folks, bringing taxpayers dollars together to make a few wealthy people wealthier.

And just next door in New Jersey, asstaggering 1.6 billion USD is being spent on a new Football Stadium, not far from the new $300 million New Jersey Devil's arena which at least had the benefit is actually being a multi-purpose civic facility built at the behest of a team practicing an actual sport.

Texas might have problems paying for its school system, repeatedly having to delay the purchase of new school books due to lack of funding, but this hasn't stopped state and local goverments from ponying up hundreds of millions of dollars to build the Cowboys a new stadium.

You may have heard the sound of sucking the last time you were in or around Indianapolis, Indiana. Depending on where you were, this might have been from all of the manufacturing jobs and industrial base being sucked out of the state, or it may simply been the tax dollars being sucked out of your pocket to help pay for a new Football Stadium. Note that the new Stadium replaces an "old" one - 25 years old...  

And the baseball Twins in Minnesota could count on getting similar government handouts despite continuing draconian cuts to childcare and healthcare subsidies for the working poor.

Why is that despite such supposedly severe partisan polarization in the US, such accomplishments can be made in supposedly every part of the country? Is it because of overwhelming popularity on the part of citizens and sports fans on whose behalf these projects are being undertaken?

Not so much. If a study cited by the downright communist National Taxpayer Union (author's note: that's snark for those unaware of who this group is. Their handicapping of the 2008 election in the US will give you a better idea), it is readily apparent that policy-makers embark on such boondoggles despite, not because of, popularity among citizens:

Although a casual observer might believe that the flood of tax dollars poured into new stadiums sprang from some public mandate, appearances are deceiving. When asked, taxpayers generally oppose spending tax dollars to build stadiums. The following graph shows the results of a 1997 Rasmussen Poll in which 64 percent of respondents answered "no" to the question of whether tax dollars should ever be used to build a professional sports facility.

This margin of disapproval would probably be even higher were it not for extreme pressure from public figures, and the media-fueled belief that bad publicity associated with losing a sports franchise will harm their city's image. Even strong initial skepticism can frequently be overcome because well-funded stadium backers are allowed to put stadium-financing legislation before voters multiple times until it passes. In many eastern states that lack initiative and referendum laws, the issue of whether or not to subsidize stadiums with tax dollars needs no approval from voters at all.

No, stadium boondoggles on the taxpayer dime are not done for reasons of popularity. So, if not popularity, why?

Ah, dear reader, we may all have different ways to fill in the blanks on this question. But the framing of the response comes down to one thing. It may take overwhelmingly popularity to get something done for average citizens like you and I, substantial things like feeding and housing the disadvantaged, reforming a broken, arbitrary and elitist healthcare delivery system, or ending the war in Iraq. But if it involves further lining the pockets of the already insanely wealthy, like owners of professional sports
franchises, you can bet your representative, Republican or Democratic, is on it, working together to get things done.

The very model of bipartisanship that the Villagers applaud.